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Building blocks of action and goal comprehension in a newborn visual system

BUILDING BLOCKS OF ACTION AND GOAL COMPREHENSION
IN A NEWBORN VISUAL SYSTEM
by
Jason G. Goldman
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CAIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(PSYCHOLOGY)
August 2013

For any animal, human or nonhuman, the ability to quickly and accurately form representations of the actions of others is critical to daily life. A gazelle living in the African grasslands has just seconds to infer the impending action of a stalking leopard or hyena in order to avoid predation. The predator, likewise, must work to infer the escape trajectory of the fleeing gazelle if it is to eat that day. For a human, the rapid assessment of the intentionality of an action leads to the critical distinction between judging an act such as pouring hot coffee on another individual as immoral or simply as the unfortunate consequence of a careless mistake. Indeed, from relatively sparse visual input (i.e. the surface features of an action that are projected onto the retina), human adults, human infants, and non-human animals are capable of inferring a wide range of hidden psychological variables, including whether social interactions are cooperative or competitive, and whether actions are intentional or accidental. Relatively little is known, however, about the development of action comprehension skills in the newborn brain. Does action recognition have an extended development, constructed upon simpler building blocks only after extensive experiences observing other social agents and their actions? Or, alternatively, does the newborn brain begin interpreting actions in a sophisticated way upon the onset of visual experience?

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BUILDING BLOCKS OF ACTION AND GOAL COMPREHENSION
IN A NEWBORN VISUAL SYSTEM
by
Jason G. Goldman
A Dissertation Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CAIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
(PSYCHOLOGY)
August 2013